Common Sense Media Review
By Chris Morris
,
based on child development research. How do we rate?
Delightful way to learn about animals, people, and more.
Parents Need to Know
Why Age 6+?
Any Positive Content?
Where to Download
Videos and Photos
Barefoot World Atlas
Privacy Rating Warning
Privacy Rating
Our expert evaluators create our privacy ratings. The ratings are designed to help you understand how apps use your data for commercial purposes.
Pass
Meets our minimum requirements for privacy and security practices.
Warning
Does not meet our recommendations for privacy and security practices.
Fail
Does not have a privacy policy and should not be used.
Privacy Rating
Our expert evaluators create our privacy ratings. The ratings are designed to help you understand how apps use your data for commercial purposes.
Pass
Meets our minimum requirements for privacy and security practices.
Warning
Does not meet our recommendations for privacy and security practices.
Fail
Does not have a privacy policy and should not be used.
What's It About?
Children explore the globe by spinning and pinching to zoom in on objects of interest. By touching icons, they're able to access short descriptions, which they can read themselves or have read to them by BBC presenter Nick Crane. Most objects also include photos. Selecting country flags will show current conditions in that country, including time, distance (if you enable location-finding), and current weather. Barefoot World Atlas also has a sizable soundtrack that changes to appropriate music as you focus on different parts of the world.
Is It Any Good?
Barefoot World Atlas makes learning fun, with a thorough selection of interesting objects and real-time information that's applicable to the real world instead of a dry factoid (such as current weather and time, along with carbon footprints, of capital cities). The music is a nice background and the calm narration by BBC presenter Nick Crane is well done.
One annoyance: Some of the objects don't seem like they're in the logical place on the globe. Still, that's a minor annoyance. Curious kids will enjoy Barefoot World Atlas.
Talk to Your Kids About ...
Encourage further research on items of interest at the local library or cultural fairs.
Track the weather or currency rate in another country, to show how things change in other lands.
Try out some of the activities shown, or visit the local zoo to see the animals the app discusses.
App Details
- Devices : iPhone , iPod Touch , iPad
- Subjects : Science : animals , geology , plants , Social Studies : cultural understanding , geography , global awareness
- Skills : Self-Direction : academic development , personal growth
- Pricing structure : Paid
- Release date : March 15, 2012
- Genre : Reference
- Publisher : Touch Press
- Version : 3.0.12
- Minimum software requirements : iOS 9.0 or later
- Last updated : November 11, 2020
Did we miss something on diversity?
Research shows a connection between kids' healthy self-esteem and positive portrayals in media. That's why we've added a new "Diverse Representations" section to our reviews that will be rolling out on an ongoing basis. You can help us help kids by
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